Sources in the House of Lords say peers will try to ‘improve the legislation’ through the process but not necessarily through parliamentary defeats.
Photograph: Kirsty Wigglesworth/PA

The government now has an extremely tight deadline to pass even a short bill through the Houses of Parliament, but it is still possible to meet its article 50 deadline of the end of March.

One option to speed up the process through the House of Lords would be to offer extra scrutiny days in return for reducing the gaps that are usually left in between the different stages of a bill. There are also emergency options for the government to secure extra days to debate.

In Theresa May’s favour is the fact that there is not a large appetite in either the Commons or the Lords to actively block the process.

The SNP and Lib Dems will be likely to vote against the bill if their amendments are not passed, and some Labour rebels will join them. But overall Labour has no desire to appear to be trying to prevent the referendum result being honoured.

Sources in the House of Lords say peers will try to “improve the legislation” through the process but not necessarily through parliamentary defeats. Key issues are likely to be around the type of Brexit, including economic access and the relevance of the parliamentary vote on the final deal – an issue on which May could be forced to move on.

Peers also say they want to avoid so-called ping-pong, in which legislation is not passed so bounces back and forth between the two houses. As in the Commons, most peers do not want to be see to be trying to frustrate the will of the people.

The judgment says the length and form of the legislation is entirely down to the government so we can expect the draft to be tightly written. Lawyers have warned against the political desire for a one-line bill. However, ministers could still be pushing for that in order to meet the timetable and reduce the possibility of amendments, which have to be shown to be relevant to the title of the bill.